Well, well, well.  Now we recognize how much of a burden it is to run one’s own website.  Sorry for such a dismal lack of updates, this one will be a good one.  Re-entry has so far been relatively painless.  I’m really happy to see that most of my friends are doing well and the drama is at a minimum.  Jet lag is a lot tougher coming back, but somehow I don’t feel too bad about sleeping late.  Clothes, pamphlets and papers of all sizes and shapes and colors, CD player, wires for a slew of devices, photographs, candy, cell phones, bills of various denominations and nationalities, headphones, films, pens, books and bags all still litter the floor of my room and the outside hallway.

Many of these things don’t seem right here.  This trinket from Japan . . . that shell from Bali . . . this camera from Singapore (Nikon D70s!  what what!) . . . they make no sense in the domicile of my adolescence.  I’ve made the trip back and forth to the US enough times to be numbed to some of the usual things that cause culture shock - body size, car size, ego size - but the air is different.  It smells a little more tense.  Everyone is worried about everything.  I think that if the purpose of terrorism is to disrupt the life of everyday society and put everyone in fear of everyone else, then the terrorists are winning.  We still go out and perform the actions of being happy, friendly, relaxing, but it all has this underlying aggression under it, like “we’re going to go swimming in the pond to spite Al Qaeda, kids, so buckle up now.”  Red Sox fan(atic)s are in high abundance, further adding to the “us or them” simplistic sports mentality our commander-in-chief so effectively instilled in the American breast.  On the other hand, some things haven’t changed a bit.  My parents still eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch and dinner that they did 8 months ago, my boys still hang at the same bars and the cops are still on a power trip.  It puts me in this surreal place where I wonder if I was really on the other side of the world for a year.

Stencil piece, Kuta Beach

So, I’m not even going to talk about Bali other than to say that I now know someone crazy enough to let me talk them into coming with me, and that as places for patching up relationships go, paradise is a pretty good choice.  Basically, when you think of the most incredible place on Earth, you think of Bali.  But don’t take my word for it, just go look at the pictures!  While you’re in the galleries you can also check out two recently added galleries from Kuala Lumpur and Singapore.  And speaking of pictures and as mentioned above, I have a new fancy shmancy digital SLR that I will be testing out in the next few weeks!  I’ve already used it to shoot my cousin’s wedding and the auspicious first sighting of a giant Moose(!) at my parents’ place in New Hampshire this weekend.  I’m going to be doing a lightning tour of the northeast and LA in the next month, so there should be lots of interesting things to take pictures of.  The idea to drive across the country is on hold this year, as fate now looks like it will be taking me to central Europe starting sometime in September.  Stay tuned.

Waiting for a delayed flight to Boston.  Fox News (fair and balanced) is blaring:

More troops needed for the meat grinder.

US gas prices at all time high (”We’ll be fine as long as crude supplies aren’t interrupted.”) of over $2.50 a gallon.

In some other country, there are thousands of kids in jail with convicted pedophiles.

Make the plane on time but the last two days (weeks, months) were intense.  For some reason these goodbyes don’t seem authentic, like it’s just a couple days or I’ll never see them again.  No, that’s not quite right but I can’t put my finger on it right now.

No wait at the gate, smaller jet than I’m used to.  Sit behind two boys from the military.  One has a tattoo shaped like a star with the lines made up of guns.  They look young enough to know about nothing and big enough to kill a man.  Or me.  I couldn’t stop them, so I guess might does make right after all.  Why am I thinking this?

First five hours uneventful.  Eat a veggie meal I asked for at the last minute and actually got.  Read a bit more of the book I picked up in Bali (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) and thoughtfully listen to the “Authentic Sounds” radio channel.  It’s playing “Patriotic Country Vol. 2″ with such rousing numbers as “A Country Boy Can Survive”, “You’ve Got to Stand For Somethin’” and “Livin’ in the Promise land”.  Do the airline magazine crossword (106 Across: Pith Helmet = Topee.  52 Down: Gray soldier = Reb).  Watch bits of a military flick “Men of Honor” and a romantic comedy set in Boston, “Fever Pitch”.  Stretch for a bit by the toilets and catch snippets of the military boys’ conversation.  They use words like “yes sir”, “Baghdad”, “shithole”, “first plane back home”.

Go to sleep.

Wake up halfway for a snack.  Chinese noodles and lemon cookie.  Watch the in-flight maps with their calm colors.  Watch the “miles to destination” tick down.  Somewhere south of Anchorage and west of a place called Prince Rupert I begin to have a minor panic attack.  I haven’t thought much at all about going “home”.  Tonight I will sleep in my old bed in my old room in my old town.  What is it like in the U.S., the “greatest country in the world”?  Will I be afraid of people?  Is it violent?  Obnoxious?  Fat?  Who are my friends there?  What did I miss?  What will I do?  Drive to California, see the country, as I’ve been telling people in Japan?  Can I really do that?  I won’t be special anymore.  I won’t be a minority, a foreigner who you’ve never met.  I won’t be special even if I ride a motorcycle and skateboard and cook and speak Japanese and live alone and have a job.  My photographs are just like everyone’s.

Go back to sleep.  Go back to sleep.  Go back to sleep.  Go back . . . .

12 hours left in my life in this place
I’ve said many good byes and still have some left
Packing in an illogical flurry
So excited and yet so worried
I wish I could say I was thinking
Farther ahead than the next 5 minutes
But I guess it’s my slogan
That I’ll sleep when I’m dead
And before it’s all over
I’ll see your face again
Under the Balinese sun